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In Reply to: RE: cMP - the open source high-end Memory Player posted by cics on December 30, 2007 at 05:42:01
With more break-in, I'm stunned at what I'm hearing for the price. This setup is absolutely high-end, for about $500 for board, 320GB WD 2.5" drive, 1GB RAM, basic case (but good power supply), stock Juli@. I'm normally using a Krakatoa power cable, but in switching to the stock cable + PS Audio Duet conditioner, there is almost no difference.I think some computer audiophiles at Intel were involved in designing this board.;)
Any new reports from anyone else using the D510MO?
The rest of my system:
D510MO -> Juli@ -> AZ Silver Ref -> Arcam A90 -> AZ Satori -> VS VR-1cics, try this board!
Dave
Edits: 05/14/10 05/14/10Follow Ups:
In replay to your question if anyone else has tried the D510MO.
I tried the D510MO motherboard with some kingston value ram and the OS installed on a CF card. I use a USB to i2s converter to my DAC.
I ran this board for about 5 hours and listened a few times, I found that the sound quality using the USB to i2s converter was very poor. XP was optimised according to the instructions. I was disappointed with the USB sound quality.
My other CMP computer uses the GA-G31M-ES2L motherboard which provides excellent sonic results using the same USB to i2s converter.
Does anyone have an idea why the D510MO sounds so bad when using USB.
I would like to persist with this ITX board, but I dont think there is anywhere for me to go with it. I did turn off Hyperthreading in the bios which made some sonic improvement, but not enough for me to say this board is good when using USB. I'm sure AstroD is correct saying that it sounds good with the Juli@ card, but I dont use that card.
Should I try to "run in" the motherboard for longer. How long is enough?
Can anyone else try testing the USB sound quality on this board?
Thanks
Erin
Did you make sure the USB port used for the DAC has its own IRQ? It's cumbersome to find out, but when isolated, it really helps.
Hi, I did check the IRQ and I'm fairly sure that they had separate IRQ's but I will have to double check that and get back to you. But It will be a few days as I have to reinstall the OS.
I also did disconnect all other USB devices when listening and did not notice any improvement. Do I still need a separate IRQ even if not using any other devices? I also tried various BIOS settings as well as even turning of PCI devices in the BIOS.
I even tried running the D510MO off my big Seasonic S2 power supply. This did make a just noticeable improvement, but it was still no good.
Of course, I am not disputing anyone else's findings with this board and the Juli@, just reporting my observations with USB.
Thanks.
Your point on IRQ is important and will have impact on SQ.
Atom processors + NM10 chipset has large appeal for audio due to low power consumption and display interface is from CPU. But it lacks SSE4.1 and 2MB L2 cache. There are other limitations like "in-order execution" making computationally intensive tasks less efficient. This suggests Atom based solutions are best for non-upsampling. This leaves upsampling to the DAC which is not ideal. Atom processors using 32nm + DDR3 technology may improve this situation.
Core i3 + H55 is superior when upsampling and power consumption comes very close. NM10 uses 2.5 watts vs H55's 3.5 watts. Only downside on Core i3 based solutions is the display interface which is from the chipset.
Intel's D520MO mobo doesn't provide a P4 connector - you may want to try either ASUS or Gigabyte options which offers a P4. Annoying thing about Asus is its limited BIOS options, similarly, GB does a stupid thing by adding another SATA chip (to provide 4 SATA ports as Intel's NM10 chipset only does 2). Importance of P4 is dicussed here .
Overall these mobos will yield excellent results - you'll get better results with a P4 connector as this allows moving the CPU to the dirty side. For the Asus option you could use Crystal CPU ID to set lower freq and voltage.
Interesting. Could I safely just hook up another ATX PSU to the P4 on my UD2H?
That's how my power is configured using UD2H. You don't need a fancy secondary ATX supply - for me it just has to be silent. Sound would improve significantly. Also make sure your BIOS is setup correctly (follow discussion here ).
On F9d BIOS, I don't see anything new just GB's notes on changing CPU microcode which I consider very important.
I installed F9d last night. I can't be sure it's real, but it seemed to sound better after the new BIOS was installed.
I tried PCI Latency Tool 3.1 and it seems to be incompatible with Win7.
I've done all the tweaks to the UD2H BIOS with great results. Awhile ago I tried changing the QPI but it wouldn't boot so I left that alone. I'm running stable at VCore 0.675v, Graphics core 400mhz / 0.850v, 100 BCLK, 6.0 memory / standard, etc.
I recently changed the AC setup to be Krakatoa -> PS Audio Duet -> Krakatoa (borrowing it from the now-unused DAC) -> UD2H and it sounds really good, very dynamic, clean midrange, very live, and using the Duet doesn't seem to have any negative effects as it has previously with sources and amps. This is using the 1212m and analog outs, Mogami 1/4" to RCA cable (remarkable cable for the price). Without using the Duet, the DAC sounds slightly better, but giving the PC the cleanest possible power, it pulls ahead. I've never actually tried these two power cables with the Duet, very impressive combo.
On using a second ATX PSU, is it a must to hardwire the dirty P24 connector to be permanently on? If I don't do that, do I always turn on the second dirty PSU first? Is there any risk of damaging the CPU this way? Thanks.
I love the ability to save and restore entire BIOS configurations with this board.
Dave
On using a second ATX PSU, is it a must to hardwire the dirty P24 connector to be permanently on?
Yes. There isn't an easier way to turn on an ATX PSU. Power at P4 is not a problem as CPU startup is controlled via BIOS and P24. If you haven't moved P4 to the dirty side yet, do so and let us know of improvements.
PS - thanks for the tip on saving / loading BIOS. What a pleasure.
I hooked up an old Antec True Power 2.0 PSU to P4 after enabling "always on" as described, and it works great. The improvement is one of those small but welcome global improvements. Does the quality of the P4 power matter much if it's only powering the CPU? Let me know if you find out what the UD2H P4 actually powers.
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